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Tuesday, December 17, 2013

‘I am sitting
here this morning,’ announced the magistrate, ‘as the coroner assigned to assist
the police in their investigations. The task of this court is to establish the
cause of the death of Ms Democracy. The relatives of Democracy, commonly known
as Citizens, have claimed that she died as the result of a vicious attack on Democracy
by Dictatorship. On the other hand the representatives of Dictatorship,
commonly known as cadres, have firmly maintained that they always supported and
loved Democracy and would never do anything to harm her, and that she died of
natural causes. On the other hand, the Women’s Hobby has suggested that death
may have been caused by Gender Based Murder, sometimes known as GBM. Because of
these conflicting interests, the court will hear postmortem reports from three
different pathologists.’

The
magistrate now turned towards the investigating offer. ‘Inspector, is this GBM
the former husband of Democracy?’

‘Good
gracious no,’ replied the inspector, ‘GBM has never had any relationship with
Democracy. GBM and Democracy have always been completely incompatible.’

‘Quite
so,’ said the magistrate. ‘But in the case of the death of a wife we must
always treat the husband as the first suspect. So who is the husband of the
late departed?’

‘She
was happily married to Constitution,’ replied the inspector.

‘Constitution!’
exclaimed the magistrate. ‘But surely it is the job of Constitution to protect
Democracy! How did he allow his own dear partner to die?’

‘He
is in jail, M’Lord, awaiting trial.’

‘On
what charge?’

‘On
a charge of trying to limit the powers of the Dictator, M’Lord. Constitution is
now locked up indefinitely, pending correction in a correctional facility.’

‘Did
he not seek bail?’

‘He
did my Lord. He wanted to be freed so that he could protect Democracy. But bail was
refused.’

‘Refused?’
said the magistrate. ‘On what grounds?’

‘On
the ground that Democracy was already dead!’

‘Quite
right,’ declared the magistrate. ‘There’s no need for a Constitution when
Democracy is already dead. Do let’s get on with hearing from the first
pathologist, Mr Mfwa.’

Mr
Mfwa walked to the witness stand and swore never to tell the truth, so help him
God. ‘Now give us your report on the cause of death,’ requested the magistrate.

‘The first thing
I noticed when I examined the body,’ began Mfwa, ‘was that all the fingers were
missing.’

‘Had she died
from loss of blood?’ asked the magistrate.

‘Oh no,’ replied
Mfwa. ‘Apparently they had been sliced off many years earlier when she tried to
hang on to a banner saying We want
freedom of the press.’

‘Did she have
any other wounds?’ asked the magistrate irritably.

‘Both of her
legs were missing?’ declared Mfwa.

‘What had caused
that?’

‘Going on a
protest march without a police permit.’

‘Was that the
cause of death?’

‘Oh no,’ replied
Mfwa. ‘But it had caused her to be confined to her house. That’s why we haven’t
been seeing much of Democracy in recent years.’

‘Look, Mr Mfwa,’
shouted the magistrate. ‘Did you find out the cause of death?’

‘Yes,’ he
replied calmly. ‘I found a very large aspirin stuck in her throat.’

‘So she
suffocated!’ said the magistrate.

‘No,’ said Mfwa,
‘she died of a very bad headache. Natural causes.’

‘You’re giving
me a very bad headache,’ sneered the magistrate. Then, turning to the Clerk of
Court, ‘Bring on the next pathologist.’

‘Mr Yafwa,’ said
the magistrate wearily, ‘Do you have any different explanation for the death of
Democracy?’

‘She died,’ said
Yafwa slowly, ‘because her head had been cut off by one slice from a very sharp
instrument, probably a panga. Death was from unnatural causes.’

The magistrate now
turned to Mfwa, ‘Well,’ he said sarcastically, ‘I wonder how you noticed
missing fingers and legs, but failed to notice a missing head?’

‘It is possible
to wonder at a lot of things,’ sneered Mfwa. ‘I wonder why my learned colleague
never considered that I had to cut off the head in order to find the aspirin
lodged in her throat.’

The magistrate
now turned hopefully to the third pathologist. ‘Mr Fwile, to what do you
attribute the death of Democracy?’

‘M’Lord, I agree
with my learned colleague Mr Yafwa that the cause of death was decapitation
caused by a single mighty slice from a very sharp blade.’

‘In order words,
unnatural causes?’ asked the magistrate.

‘Oh no,’ said
Yafwa. ‘Bearing in mind Newton’s Second Law of Motion, the large mass of the
blade, combined with its high rate of deceleration when striking the neck, and the
large concentration of pressure caused by the sharpness of the blade, it was
absolutely natural and inevitable that the blow would cause decapitation. I
have no hesitation in concluding that death was by natural causes.’

‘On the basis of
the majority view of the pathologists,’ said the magistrate, ‘I declare that
Democracy died of natural causes, and that no criminal investigations are
necessary. I declare the case closed, and hope that the soul of Democracy will
rest in peace.’ So saying, he rose to his feet and disappeared into his
chambers.

As people left
the court, they talked amongst themselves:

‘It’s just as
well it wasn’t murder.’

‘We don’t want
murder here.’

‘We are a
peaceful people.’

‘I always
thought she was a bit of a trouble maker.’

‘Well out the
way if you ask me.’

‘Good thing that
Constitution has been locked up. He was the one giving her wrong ideas.’

Wednesday, December 11, 2013

‘Sometimes,’ I
sighed, ‘I think Michael doesn’t know what he’s doing. How can he be sacking
the nurses for asking for more money? Isn’t he the very one who promised them
more money in their pockets?’

‘Of
course he knows what he’s doing,’ laughed Kupela. ‘He’s trying to force them
all to go and get jobs in Britain, where they’ll be paid four times as much. Then
they’ll be able to send money to their relatives here, and we’ll all have more
money in our pockets.’

‘Don’t
be silly,’ I said. ‘If all our nurses go to the UK, who’s going to run our
hospitals? Our entire health system will collapse! You’ve got to see the bigger
picture!’

‘Poor
Daddy,’ Kupela scoffed, ‘it’s you who can’t see the bigger picture. Nowadays
you’ve got to think globally. Have you considered that that a nurse earning
$200 dollars in Beijing thinks that $800 dollars in Lusaka is a small fortune?
So we can easily attract Chinese nurses to come here!’

‘Hah!’
I exclaimed. ‘What a silly argument! In that case the Chinese nurses would also
go to London to earn an even larger fortune!’

‘Oh
no they wouldn’t,’ said Kupela, ‘because London hospitals practice Western
medicine and don’t recruit Chinese nurses.’

‘Well
done!’ I laughed. ‘You’ve just destroyed your own argument because our Zambian
hospitals also practice Western medicine.’

‘On
no they don’t,’ retorted Kupela. ‘They’re not practicing anything at all
because they don’t have any medicine or equipment. The wards are just waiting
rooms for the mortuary. This country just hasn’t got the money to provide
health care or education. Poor old Chikwanda is borrowing a billion dollars a
year to run schools that make us dull and hospitals that make us sick. And what’s
more, the country will soon be completely bankrupt!’

‘So
the answer is to sack all the nurses?’

‘It’s
all part of Michael’s new Master Plan. He’s bringing in 20,000 nurses from
China.’

‘What?
We’ll all be going to Chinese hospitals?’

‘Of
course not, these hospitals will be for the Chinese.’

‘What!
There won’t be enough Chinese patients for so many hospitals, unless they’re
all planning to be sick!’

‘Michael
knows what he’s doing. He’s going to bring in another million Chinese to take
over the rest of the mines, set up manufacturing plants, turn the forests into
plantations, and so on.’

‘Half
a minute! Hold on! If the Chinese take over all our hospitals, where is the
health service for the rest of us?’

‘We
shall return to traditional medicine, which worked very well in pre-colonial
days. In those days people were very healthy and lived to a ripe old age. Did
you know that our very high rate of maternal mortality is caused by modern maternity
hospitals? Traditional birth attendants are much safer.’

‘This
is all romantic poppy-cock,’ I spluttered. ‘What are traditional healers going
to do about cholera, typhoid, TB and HIV? Huh! Answer me that!’

‘These
are all urban diseases,’ she replied calmly. ‘We’ll all return to village life.
Back to the land! Anyway, we never really mastered city life. Never became
properly urbanized. Lusaka is not a city, it is just a collection of villagers
in a huge village. That’s why it is so chaotic and full of urban diseases!’

‘So
our cities will be abandoned? Left standing empty?’

‘Of
course not! The Chinese will come in to run the factories, smelt the iron, sort
out the traffic lights, and that sort of thing.’

‘So
what shall we be doing in the village?’

‘We
shall be on display for the Chinese tourists. Cultural tourism is becoming very
popular and we can rake in a lot of money. That’s why Michael is building all these
roads everywhere, so that the Chinese can visit the villages. The Chinese are
very interested to see what Africa looked like before the missionaries came and
ruined everything.’

‘So
what sort of government shall we have?’

‘Exactly,
that’s the question. Why d’you think Michael grabbed the draft constitution
from the Technical Committee? He intends to write one which fits into his
Master Plan!’

‘So
how will it be different?’

‘Difficult
to say,’ said Kupela. ‘Much of central government will undoubtedly have to be
abolished, since government will have to be localized under the chiefs. We
wouldn’t need a judiciary, the chief would preside over each local court. Maybe
there would still be a DC.’

‘A
District Commissioner?’

‘No,
a District Chinese, to make sure that the villagers treat the Chinese tourists
with proper respect.’

‘So
would we still have a parliament?’

‘Obviously
not,’ said Kupela. ‘We would just follow tradition and customary law.’

‘But
who would govern the Chinese?’

‘They’re
already well organized and never take any notice of us. They would probably
want to co-ordinate their activities with other Chinese operating in neighbouring
countries. It is rumoured that they might set up a Chinese Federal Government
based in Harare.’

‘So
would we still have a president and ministers?’

‘Of
course,’ said Kupela.

‘But
what would they be doing?’

‘Obviously
they would have to collect taxes so that they can continue to live in
ministerial houses, travel to international conferences and that sort of
thing.’

Tuesday, December 3, 2013

‘I’m
glad you’ve asked for a bad one,’ I chuckled, ‘because good kings are hard to
find. I think I’ve got just the sort of king you’re looking for. His name was
King Panga, and he lived long ago in the Kingdom of Zedia.’

‘Why
was he a bad king?’

‘Who
can tell why he was bad. Maybe when he was small, his mother didn’t punish him
when he did wrong things.’

‘No,
I meant why did people say he was bad.’

‘Because,’
I explained, ‘King Panga was far too bossy, and wouldn’t listen to anybody. He
would tell the police whom to lock up, instead of letting them decide for
themselves. And he would lock up his enemies even if they hadn’t done anything
wrong.’

‘Look,
Grandpa,’ said Nawiti, ‘that’s how kings were in those days. It’s no good being
a king if you can’t boss everybody around. The job just attracts that type of
person.’

‘You’ve
got a point there,’ I conceded. ‘But King Panga also used to waste the people’s
money. He wasted a lot of money building a tall tower, reaching right up into
the sky, so that he could walk up to Heaven to consult God.’

‘So
he went to Heaven?’

‘No.
The tower got only halfway, then it fell down.’

‘Well,’
said Nawiti, ‘that’s the sort of thing you expect from a king. What else did he
do?’

‘He
built himself a huge golden coach pulled by twenty-four elephants…’

‘You
mean horses.’

‘No.
In those days there weren’t any horses in Zedia.’

‘Look,
Grandpa, you have to understand how things were in those days. That’s the sort
of thing kings do. You can’t have a king without a golden coach. The other kings
would laugh at him.’

‘But
he was wasting money. There were no nurses or medicines in the hospitals, no
books in the schools and no seeds for planting. Meanwhile the king was wasting
money on building roads everywhere so that he could drive his coach
everywhere.’

‘So
what did they do?’

‘Led
by a bishop, they all went to the palace to see the king. And the bishop spoke
for all of them, saying You can’t just
rule anyhow like this, you must have a constitution.

‘And he king replied A constitution, what’s that?

‘Then
the bishop told him, saying A
constitution is a set of rules which we will give you, setting out the limits
of your powers, requiring you to listen to others, and making sure you look
after us and not just yourself.

‘And the king replied, saying Show me a copy of these rules!

‘But
the bishop replied, saying We shall show
you a copy of these rules in two years time, after we have agreed amongst
ourselves.

‘And
the king sneered, saying Huh, I could do
the job myself in ten minutes.’

‘And did they come back in two
years time?’

‘Oh
yes,’ I said. ‘The bishop and his priests went all round the country, holding
meetings everywhere with everybody, and finally they drew up a constitution of
ten basic rules which, even if followed by a foolish king, could make him appear
quite sensible.’

‘So
they went back to the palace to give the constitution to the king?’

‘They
did indeed. But they found the king’s soldiers at the gate, armed with machetes.
And the sergeant in charge said The king
says that it does not need a thousand people to deliver ten rules. He commands
that only ten people can enter the palace, each carrying one rule. These ten
people will constitute the constitution which shall be given to the king!’

‘And
did the people agree?’ asked Nawiti.

‘They
had no choice,’ I explained, ‘because the machetes were very sharp.’

‘Oh
dear,’ said Nawiti, ‘what happened in the palace? Was the constitution
presented to the king?’

‘Nobody
knows what happened inside that palace,’ I said grimly. ‘The people waited all
night outside the gates. Early next morning there was a sound of marching, the
gates opened, and out came a company of soldiers carrying on their shoulders
ten coffins, which were laid on the ground before the weeping crowd.’

‘Then
the sergeant in charge addressed the crowd, saying The king has declared that he finds these ten rules unnecessary. He
also declares that it is not the job of the people to give the king a
constitution, it is the duty of the king to give his people a constitution.

‘With
this announcement, the sergeant threw down his machete, its blade sticking into
the lid of one of the coffins, the cold steel quivering in the morning air. There! shouted the sergeant, There is your new constitution.’

‘That
wasn’t a constitution, it was just a machete!’ said Nawiti, as tears streamed
down her face.

‘It
was a rule of governance,’ I explained. ‘Down the side of the machete blade was
inscribed Nobody can question the King. This
made it clear that the country was not to be ruled by a constitution, but by
the machete. And that is why, from that day to this, a
machete is always known as a panga in the land of Zedia.’

‘Oh
dear,’ said Nawiti, ‘he really was a bad king.’

‘Yes,’
I replied. ‘Let that be a lesson to you. If you ask for a bad king, that’s what
you get.’

Tuesday, November 26, 2013

‘Ha
ha!’ Sara hooted. ‘See how we wasted all our money, effort, agony and support
trying to get Chipolopolo into the World Cup. And instead along comes
Shepolopolo with an effortless smile, trounces everybody and off they go. See how
they have quietly shamed all the noisy, pompous and useless men!

‘Shush,’
laughed Kupela, ‘We women are supposed to pretend that our men are superior. It
is our job to make them feel strong and powerful. Soccer is supposed to be a
man’s game, and our job is just to wash and iron their football shirts and…’

‘Wash
their football shirts!’ Sara cackled, ‘Hardly any of them play! Ten thousand go
to the stadium to watch twenty-two men kick a ball up and down. Another fifty
thousand watch on television. They cheer it, pay for it, discuss it, celebrate
their victories with beer, mourn their losses with beer, but they don’t play
it! Most of them are too fat and unfit to play it! If the Minister of Sport had
the ball at his feet, he wouldn’t even be able to see it! The plain fact is
that they’re no good at it. But when we put together a team of eleven young
women – off they go to the World Cup!’

‘It
was because they had a male coach,’ I said.

‘What
do you know about it?’ scoffed Sara. ‘I’m giving you a red card!’

‘The
way our society works,’ said Kupela, ‘our female role is to support our men,
and make them feel successful and powerful. They run the government, they are
the heads of household, they take the decisions. When they secretly feel
uncertain and incapable, and get in an awful mess, but try not to show it, it’s
our job to believe in them, console them, and tell them they are men, strong
and clever. Now along come these Shepolopolo and upset everything, showing that
women are better at the man’s own game! It puts the rest of us in an awkward
position! Especially if we are caught laughing!’

‘Don’t
upset yourself,’ I sneered, ‘one football game won’t overturn our traditional
patriarchy. We men are quite safe.’

‘You
don’t know what you’re talking about,’ snapped Sara. ‘There never was
traditional patriarchy. I know from what my grandmother Sibongile told me about
village life in pre-colonial days. It was the women who were in charge of the
men!’

‘Poof,’
I laughed. ‘How did they manage that?’

‘They
produced the food, and cooked it in the matriarchal cooking pot, and therefore they
controlled the production and distribution of resources.’

‘But
the men were bigger and stronger.’

‘Not
when they only got their fair share from the cooking pot. They were much
smaller then. Their only useful function was fertilization. Otherwise they were
sent away for the useless men’s games, such as fighting each other, hunting,
stealing cattle, and so on.

‘Huh,’
I said. ‘How exactly did the women control them?’

‘In
those days their games were very dangerous, so there weren’t many to control.
That’s how polygamy started, because men were outnumbered. Men were controlled by
the matriarchal cooking pot. Herbs and special muti were used to help them
provide sexual services when specially needed. But the pot also produced beer
and kachasu to put them to sleep when not needed. All sorts of feasts and
festivities were invented to keep them drunk most of the time, so that the
women could get on with their work in peace. The women had their own nsaka, or
parliament, where they could discuss the problems of men who had become a
nuisance, and also agree on suitable punishment – such as banishment to another village, or
even to live alone in the forest. In those days the playful men were under control,
and the village was rich and prosperous, and starvation was unheard of.’

‘Oh
yes,’ I sneered. ‘And how did this matriarchal utopia suddenly disappear?’

‘A
terrible catastrophe hit the land!’

‘Oh
yes? What was that? An earthquake? Volcanic eruption? Tornado?’

‘Worse
than that,’ said Sara solemnly. ‘The Europeans arrived.’

‘I
heard about that,’ I said. ‘They brought development.’

‘They
brought disaster,’ she replied grimly. ‘They came from a patriarchal society.
When the Europeans saw men being ruled by women they were appalled. They vowed
to stay in the country until they had changed the whole system, and the men
ruled the women.’

‘So
how did they do that?’ wondered Kupela.

‘They
came with their own patriarchal cooking pot, to cook up a different form of
government.’

‘And
what was in the pot?’

‘A
completely new system of social organization: Schools; wage employment; civil
service; army; parliament; ministers; beer halls; soccer games. A new public
domain of control. These were the essential ingredients of the patriarchal
cooking pot.’

‘No
food in the patriarchal cooking pot?’

‘No.
It was more ideological than gastronomical.’

‘And
the pot was only for men?’

‘Exactly.
The public domain was only for men, and women were kept out. Women had to stay in
the home and in the village, which became the domestic domain. This foreign
system was called colonial government, and it’s aim was to put men in charge.’

‘And
did the Europeans succeed?’

‘It
took them sixty years, but they successfully disempowered and subordinated the
women, and put the men in charge. Having fully established this male colonial
government, they left in 1964. All record of women’s earlier dominance was expunged
from the history books.’

‘But
today, at this late stage,’ wondered Kupela, ‘can we still return to our old
traditional values, our earlier prosperity, and chase these hopeless playful men
out of government?’

‘Of
course we can!’ declared Sara. ‘And the revolution has already begun with the
famous victory of our brave sisters, the heroic Shepolopolo!’

Tuesday, November 19, 2013

‘I feel sorry
for Stiffen Mususha,’ said Kupela. ‘One minute he’s an honorable minister and
the next minute he’s a dishonorable scoundrel.’

‘Half
a minute,’ I said, ‘he had a forged certificate saying he was qualified as an accountant,
when in fact he was only qualified as an acrobat.’

‘That’s
not true,’ said Kupela. ‘He had a certificate from NIPA saying that he had been
awarded a DA. It was not his fault if his employers didn’t know that NIPA stood
for National Institute for Performing Arts, and that his DA was a Diploma in
Acrobatics rather than Accountancy.’

‘Huh,’
I scoffed. ‘He willfully deceived them.’

‘It
was their fault if they didn’t check with NIPA. Maybe his employers knew very
well what they were doing. Some of them deliberately recruit acrobats into
their accountancy department to turn the books upside down, so that profit
turns into loss. Such creative accounting is just like high wire acrobatics;
everybody laughs and cheers as the acrobat walks off with their money. The
copper mines all pay high salaries to acrobatic accountants.’

‘But
he cheated.’

‘Really
Daddy,’ laughed Kupela. ‘Accountants are employed to cheat the ZRA. How can you
criticize him for having the most important basic qualification?’

‘Well,
he was not fit to be an honorable minister!’

‘None of them are honorable!’ laughed Kupela. ‘The
only difference between him and the other ministers was that he actually qualified
to do the job he was given. As Minister of Acrobatics, he was the only minister
with a relevant certificate. And his acrobatics was so good that he could walk
on his hands just as well as on his feet, and so convincingly that nobody was
quite sure which end was which, or which end he was talking out of. And when he
joined a dancing queen on the dance floor he was so acrobatic that nobody could
tell which was the dancing queen and which was the minister, especially when the
two of them were thoroughly entwined in his famous Erotic Dance of Ecstatic
Coition.’

‘I
don’t care how you try to twist the argument,’ I growled, ‘we don’t want people
who cheat and deceive to get into politics.’

‘Hah!’
Kupela hooted. ‘Now your argument has become ridiculous! There’s no other way
of getting into politics. Don’t you know that the election victory of the
Punching Fist was achieved by pure fraud?’

‘Really?’
I said. ‘You mean Michael Sata doesn’t have a Standard Four Certificate?’

‘I
wouldn’t know about that,’ she laughed. ‘But I do know that the PF Manifesto
was Perfect Fraud.’

‘On
the contrary,’ I said, ‘the Punching Fist Manifesto was a very straightforward
statement of what they intended to do when they got into office. And they’re
making progress. Where’s the fraud?’

‘It’s
all in the other one, the Perfect Fraud Manifesto!’

‘I’ve
never seen that one!’ I laughed.

‘Nobody
ever has! The Punching Fist Manifesto was seen but not heard. The Perfect Fraud
Manifesto was heard but not seen. It was proclaimed from the anthill.’

‘And
that made it fraud?’

‘It
kept changing, from one anthill to the next. At least Mususha kept the same
certificate and stuck by it. He didn’t keep changing it, or producing new ones wherever
he went.’

‘But
why do you call this anthill manifesto Perfect Fraud’

‘At
each venue it changed according to what people wanted to hear. It didn’t depend
on principles, but only longitude and latitude.’

‘Oh
yes they are!’ cackled Kupela. ‘It’s common in government for the issuing
authority to change a certificate. Nowadays you can apply to the ACC to get a
certificate certifying that you’re immune from investigation for corruption.
This is a very valuable certificate, and a great honor conferred by the highest
authority, and it automatically and vastly increases your earning capacity - far
more so than a mere Ph.D.’

‘You’re
confusing two things,’ I said. ‘What you’re talking about is a license, not a
certificate. A license can be granted or withdrawn at the discretion of the
issuing authority, depending on your behaviour. For example, a radio station
license can be withdrawn if the station makes the mistake of interviewing an
opposition party leader. But a certificate cannot be withdrawn.’

‘Nonsense,’
snorted Kupela. ‘A certificate is just the same! In fact, after NIPA issued
Mususha with his certificate, they were the very same ones who withdrew it!’

‘But
that was because he used it for accountancy instead of acrobatics!’

‘But
now he had become an honorable minister,’ retorted Kupels, ‘so they could have
given him an honorary doctorate in accountancy if they had wanted to!’

‘How
can an institute of acrobatics confer a doctorate in accountancy?’

‘The
folly of institutes and universities,’ sneered Kupela, ‘knows no bounds. I
remember one former president who had a certificate that was a complete fraud,
but a university solved the problem by giving him an honorary doctorate in law.’

‘You’ve
got the story wrong again,’ I laughed. ‘The certificate you’re talking about
was not a fraud, it was a genuine certificate and properly gained. The only
problem was that he had changed his name to fit the name on the certificate,
which didn’t belong to him.’

‘So,’
said Kupela slowly, ‘it wasn’t the certificate that was a fraud, it was him!’

Wednesday, November 13, 2013

‘This breakfast
is terrible,’ said Christine, as she looked up from her morning newspaper.
‘Even the mealie-meal porridge isn’t properly cooked.’

‘Huh,’
growled Michael, as he scowled at his i-pad, ‘You’re the one in charge of the
kitchen, I’ve got the whole country to run.’

‘That’s
the problem,’ said Christine. ‘Your party cadres have taken over the kitchen.
Those women from Petauke were all excellent cooks, but last week they were chased by a gang of your party thugs. And your cardres are useless, all they can cook is
chicken and nshima, and the nshima is lumpy.’

‘Look,
Christine,’ said Michael, putting his head in his hands, ‘For Christ sake give
me a break. I have the whole country to run, and all you can do is complain
about the kitchen staff.’

‘Excuse
me,’ said Christine. ‘An ignorant gang of your party thugs armed with pangas
have taken over my kitchen, and you’re telling me it’s nothing to do with you?
Then tell me, who is the one responsible?’

‘Try
to understand,’ he said, looking up grimly from the bad news on Watchdog, ‘We
promised in our manifesto to give jobs to unemployed youths…’

‘Did
you promise to put them in my kitchen?’ asked Christine, her voice rising.

‘You
don’t understand these things,’ growled Michael. ‘The president’s kitchen is of
the highest strategic importance. The previous cooks were a security risk, all of
them were MMD stalwarts who could have poisoned me. We promised in our
manifesto to put our faithful party members in all the important government
positions.’

‘From
what you say,’ sneered Christine, ‘it seems that the only promises you
have kept are the silly ones. And as for poisoning,’ she said, prodding her
finger disdainfully into the cold grey porridge, ‘I may already be in need of a
stomach pump.’

‘I’m
not willing to listen to this kichen tittle-tattle anymore!’ shouted Michael, ‘If
you’ve got any more questions about party matters, go and talk to Splinter
Kapimbe, he’s the one in charge of party matters. I have important matters of
state to attend to.’

‘Such
as what?’ she wondered. ‘Everyday you spend hours up there in your office, with
a long queue of people waiting. What are you doing all the time?’

‘They’re
all looking for jobs, and waving the damn manifesto in my face. Even you, I’ve
got your latest list of twenty-four nieces and nephews looking for jobs in the
foreign service.’

‘Each
embassy,’ said Christine, ‘has a first secretary, a second secretary and a
third secretary.’

‘I
know that,’ he growled. ‘All the vacancies have been filled.’

‘But
you could have a first assistant to the first secretary, and a second assistant
to the first secretary and so on. Then a first assistant to the second
secretary and a second assistant to the second secretary and a …

‘Well
done, my dear, I'd never thought of that. I’m sorry I shouted at you. You really are my best advisor. I’ll
make an announcement later this morning that I have just created another
thousand jobs…’

But
as they were talking there was a terrible racket of shouting and banging from
the kitchen, and then running into the breakfast room came a gang of ruffians
wielding kitchen knives and rolling pins! Crash! They went out as fast as they came in, straight through
the French windows. They were closely followed by a rival gang of murderous
looking thugs wielding pangas and carrying a coffin, who also disappeared
through the same French windows shouting ‘Fipayefye!
Fipayefye!’

‘So
how do you explain that!’ shouted Christine. ‘Fipayefye? Is that why they’re called the PF?’

‘Never mind them,’ said Michael. ‘Just ignore them. Splinter knows what he’s doing. Perhaps he’s cleansing
the party from anti-party elements that have infiltrated from the opposition.
Or maybe it’s normal militia training. Or it could just be rival party factions
quarreling over the food in the kitchen…’

But
as he spoke, his phone rang. ‘His Excellency here,’ replied Michael. ‘What …
The B-Team has taken over the airport? … Ten people dead? What do you expect me
to do? This is State House, not a funeral parlour … You sort it out or I’ll
sort you out!’

Michael
turned to his wife. ‘That Sillyman Jelly has lost control of his bowels again!
Why is asking me for instructions?’

‘I
thought that’s why you appointed him,’ said Christine.

Again
the phone rang. ‘His Excellency here … What? … the C-Team has captured Soweto
Market … Receiving reports of a massacre? … Just arrest them for spreading
false rumours calculated to cause general alarm and despondency … And don’t
disturb me again, I’m preparing for my Weekly Announcement of New
Appointments!’

‘I
thought that’s why you appointed her,’ said Christine. ‘But what on Earth is
going on? The B-Team taking over the airport and the C-Team taking over the
markets? Is this a panga government? I see that your man Splinter is not called
Splinter for nothing! The entire country is falling apart!’

‘Don’t
worry,’ said Michael, completely unperturbed. ‘It’s nothing like that. The
party is just practicing for Splinter’s new constitution, when the A-Team will
be in charge of State House, the B-Team in charge of parliament, the C-team in
charge of the Supreme Court and the …

‘And
the panga in charge of everybody!’ said Christine irritably, as she stood up
and folded her napkin.

‘Are
you off?’ asked Michael. ‘Where are you going?’

‘I
just thought,’ she said, ‘I should go and have a look at the progress on building our retirement house.’

Wednesday, November 6, 2013

On
board the Challenger jet sat the A-Team in all their impressive glory. In the
centre of the aircraft, on his gold-plated throne, sat the Leader of the
A-Team, His Excellency Cycle Mata. On his right, on a little wooden stool, sat
his Minister for Nonsense and Disasters, Wobbly Dotty Scotty. On his left,
sitting on the toilet, was the Smelly Hatchet Man, the frightening Splinter
Kapimbe.

‘Well,’
said Cycle Mata, ‘Why are we going to Mansa, what’s the problem there?’

‘By-election,’
said Hatchet Man. ‘The forces of darkness and evil are plotting to take over
the entire constituency by capturing votes which rightly belong to the Punching
Fist. The opposition has been using Mansa Community Radio to claim that the PF is
really the Bufi Party.’

‘So
what’s our plan?’ said Cycle Mata.

‘We
could offer to supply electricity to all the local primary schools,’ suggested Dotty
Scotty.

‘The
answer is simple,’ snarled Hatchet Man. ‘We just declare a state of emergency,
lock up the opposition and cancel all by-elections.’

‘Too
grand a plan,’ cackled Cycle Mata, ‘I’m saving that one for later. This is just
a preliminary operation. We shall just move in quickly, cancel the radio
station license and arrest the station manager on suspicion of drug trafficking.
Dotty, go and ask the pilot for our expected time of arrival so I can make some
preliminary arrangements.’

Two
minutes later Dotty Scotty came wobbling back from the pilot’s cabin, his face
even more pale than usual. ‘There’s nobody there!’

‘What
are you talking about, you old fool!’ shouted Cycle Mata.

‘The
cabin is empty. His parachute is missing.’

‘He’s
Bemba,’ said Hatchet Man darkly. ‘He’s joined the B-Team.’

‘But
look at those clouds all around us,’ said Cycle Mata, as he looked out of the
window. ‘We’re still up in the air!’

Dotty
Scotty peered out of the window. ‘Those clouds are not moving!’ But even as he
spoke, the clouds cleared and they could see that the plane was sitting on dry
land.

And
so they stepped down from the Challenger, only to find no welcoming party, no
salutes, no bootlickers, no dancing girls and no party thugs. Over in the
distance they could see a queue of people going through a large gate. A gateman
seemed to be in charge.

‘Iwe
malonda, bwela!’ shouted Cycle Mata rudely at the gateman, as the old man in a
long white beard came slowly over. ‘Iwe, mudala, where is the DC, where is the
Paramount Chief Mwata Kazembe, where is our convoy of Mercedes?’

‘No,
no, no,’ said the old man. ‘It looks like your plane must have crashed. I am St
Peter, and you have arrived at the Pearly Gates of Heaven!’

Now
Cycle turned to whisper to his two chola boys. ‘This is the Master Plan we
need. If we can just get in to see God he can work a few miracles for us. Put
money in Mansa pockets. Give them jobs overnight. Put nurses and medicines in
the clinics. All the things we promised in ninety days, nice Old God can do it
for us in a flash of lightening. This could be the solution to all our problems!
We can win the by-election after all!’

So
now Cycle Mata turned to the gateman, ‘Well malonda, or whatever you call
yourself, just let us in through your Pearly Gate so we can go and talk to your
Paramount Chief. People of our stature can’t waste time talking to the malonda
at the gate!’

‘I’m
in charge of issuing visas,’ said St Peter calmly. ‘You have to apply
beforehand. Some people wait years to get in here. Even Archbishop Milungu has
been waiting more than ten years.’

‘Piffle
and nonsense my man,’ sneered Dotty Scotty. ‘Look at that crowd of people just
walking in straight through the gate. I don’t see any sign of visas!’

‘They
are poor people from Zambia,’ explained St Peter. ‘We have a special Memorandum
of Understanding with their Ministry of Health to let them straight in. They
are innocent souls who have suffered enough, and automatically qualify for
Heaven. For them all visa requirements have been waived.’

‘Ha
ha,’ scoffed Hatchet Man, ‘We’re also from Zambia. And we’re not just Zeds like
those bedraggled ruffians and street kids, we are the A-Team!’

‘A-Team?’
wondered St Peter. ‘What does this ‘A’ stand for?’

‘We
are at the top!’ explained Dotty Scotty. ‘Those Zeds are at the bottom! We are
the ruling class! We have diplomatic passports, we don’t even need visas! We
have all the privileges! We have the money and the power!’

‘It
is easier,’ said St Peter, ‘for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle
than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.’

Dotty
Scotty whispered under this breath ‘These damn villagers talk in riddles.’ But
turning to St Peter he said ‘Look, old chap, let’s do a deal. You give us the
visas and we’ll give you the contract for the new road from Chama to Mongu.
Half the contract price up front! How’s that?’

‘Oh?’
said St Peter. ‘Why didn’t you say that was the sort of deal you’re looking
for? Then you’ve come to the wrong place. Let me explain to you where to go.
You see those stone steps over there at the edge of the cliff. Walk over to
those steps and keep going down until you reach the place where such
arrangements are organized.’

[Partly based on a storyline
suggestion from facebooker Nelson Langford Ndhlovu]

Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Sara and I had come to Speech Day at
Muchinga Secondary School, to witness our grandson Kondwa being awarded the
prize for mathematics. All the teachers were sitting at the back of the stage
as the Headmaster walked to the front.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he began, ‘I
am the Headmaster, Mr Noplan Chimbwi, and I am pleased to welcome you to the
celebration of our greatest achievements during the past year. Behind me you
see the rest of the staff who work closely with me in bringing your children to
a bright and prosperous future. Ours is a closely knit team, working in close
agreement and harmony to achieve the great ideals of this long established and
distinguished academy, always remembering our resounding motto One Muchinga,
One School, One Headmaster.

‘I
hope the old fart gets a move on,’ Sara whispered in my ear.

‘To give you some examples of the
latest developments in our school,’ continued Chimbwi, ‘I ask our Deputy
Headmaster, Mr Scotty Cholaboy, to join me here at the podium. As he spoke a
bent figure in a faded salaula suit shuffled to the front, and groveled and
slobbered before the headmaster. ‘Tell me, Cholaboy,’ rasped Chimbwi, ‘What
have you been working on recently?’

‘I’ve been buying second-hand books
for the library, Headmaster.’

‘You’ve been doing WHAT?’ screeched Chimbwi. ‘Why have you
been doing that?’

‘I know it’s a long time ago since the
school was able to buy books, Headmaster. But these second-hand books are very
cheap.’

Chimbwi now looked round at the other
teachers. ‘Can someone tell this old fool why we can’t buy books?’

A hand shot up. ‘Because, Headmaster,
the book allocation is being spent on your fuel allowance.’

‘Nonsense! Shut up! Leave the room!
Don’t come back!’

‘Where
is all the unity and harmony?’ Sara whispered.

Now an ancient old man hobbled to the
front, with the help of a stick. ‘Ah, at last, our History Teacher, Mr PaModzi
Munshumfwa. I’m sure he can help us.’

‘During colonial times,’ explained
Munshumfwa, ‘this library was full of many books. Subversive books. Scurrilous
books. Seditious books. Revolutionary books. The students read these books, and
rebelled, and took over the school. We must never make the same mistake as the
colonial authorities!’

‘Exactly,’ said Chimbwi, as Old
Munshumfwa hobbled back to his seat. ‘And you, Dotty Cholaboy, try to stay
awake in staff meetings in future. Now tell us, what is our policy on books in
the library?’

‘No second-hand books,’ muttered
Scotty.

‘No!’ screeched Chimbwi, ‘No books at
all!’

‘Very sorry for my awful mistake,’
groveled Scotty, as he shuffled back to his seat.

‘They
shouldn’t have let in the parents,’ said Sara, ‘just to see them quarreling
amongst themselves.’

‘The only books allowed in the
library,’ shouted Chimbwi, ‘are the Bible and the School Rules. Now let us hope
we get a better report from our Communications Teacher. What have you been
doing, Mr Manuel Mwalwe Mwalwe?’

‘I have put up new notice boards for
students to express their opinions, analyse current affairs, and to ask
questions of others.’

‘What!’ squealed Chimbwi. ‘As
Headmaster, I am the one in charge of information dissemination. All
information must first be approved by me and then put on the Headmaster’s
Notice Board.’

‘No,’ said Manuel calmly. ‘We have the
Independent Board Authority which authorises other groups to have their own
noticeboards.’

‘It
looks to me,’ said Sara, ‘as if this Headmaster has completely lost control of
his staff and has no idea of what’s going on.’

‘Good gracious,’ growled the
Headmaster, as he turned back to his audience, now restless and muttering
amongst themselves. ‘Let’s hope there is better news from the Maths Department.
I call upon Mr Redhot Piri Piri to explain the latest developments in maths
teaching.’

‘In this modern world,’ began Piri
Piri, ‘we’re teaching modern mathematics, such as set theory…’

‘Sex theory!’ shrieked Chimbwi, ‘I
don’t want any homosexuals here!’

‘I said set theory,’ said Piri Piri. ‘It’s
about how we analyze the mathematical relationship between members of different
overlapping groups.’

‘Different groups!’ shouted Chimbwi.
‘What are you talking about! This is subversive talk! This is seditious! The
motto of this school is One Muchinga, One School, One Headmaster. We’re not
supposed to have different groups!’

Now
his arms began to wave wildly, his face went purple, and he began to march up
and down the stage howling ‘So now I see it! You are the one behind all this! You
have foolishly revealed yourself! You are the divisive influence! You’ve been
dividing this school into groups and cliques, plotting against me, trying to
bring me down! Well let me tell you that before this day is out I’ll…’

But as he was ranting on, two men in
white coats came onto the stage. Each took him gently by an arm and guided him,
still ranting, down the steps and out of the hall.

Then
onto the stage waddled the ample figure of the School Matron, Ms Christine
Award Winner. ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ she said, ‘I do apologize for that. Our
dear Headmaster is not feeling very well, so he has asked me to distribute the School
Prizes on his behalf…’

But by now the school hall was more
than half empty, as parents scurried out with their children, quite frightened
by their strange experience.

‘If
we all run away,’ I said, ‘that’ll be the end of his career as a Headmaster.’